Ed Rampell is a Los Angeles-based film historian and critic who contributes regularly to The Progressive; he created the Progie Awards in 2007 to highlight the year’s best progressive films and filmmakers. Rampell is the author of the 2005 book Progressive Hollywood, A People’s Film History of the United States and the coauthor of three other film history books, most recently The Hawaii Movie and Television Book.
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Tinseltown’s formula for dramatizing actual political controversies is to combine an entertaining, plot-driven storyline with history, compelling characters, and star power. more
Sep 27, 2017 3:14 PM Dispatches
Kino Lorber
Despite its gloomy subject matter, the film offers some hope. more
Sep 22, 2017 2:23 PM Dispatches
In Shot, Kagan shows us how a random shooting in Los Angeles affects the victim, and the shooter, too. more
Sep 15, 2017 2:22 PM Dispatches
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An ideal film to open over Labor Day weekend, Dolores is a stand-up-and-cheer biopic about one of the American left’s iconic heroes, Dolores Huerta. more
Sep 1, 2017 4:10 PM Dispatches
Youtube
“Zero Dark Thirty” was a despicable piece of pro-CIA propaganda, but with “Detroit” the filmmaker has redeemed herself. more
Aug 3, 2017 3:24 PM Dispatches
“Comedians can say things journalists can’t...They cut right to the chase, tell you what’s going on—and make you laugh about it.” more
Aug 1, 2017 12:00 AM Magazine
In concentrating their attention on Gore, the filmmakers have created a fawning depiction of a flawed politician. more
Jul 28, 2017 10:00 AM Dispatches
With stunning cinematography, bizarre sensuality, and heaps of humor, Jodorowsky recounts in creative, entertaining ways his adolescence growing up Jewish in Chile (his parents had emigrated from Russia) more
Jul 14, 2017 1:26 PM Dispatches
Courtesy The Actors Gang
Robbins and Moyers talk about their mutual distress over the current Attorney General’s opposition to bipartisan prison reform. more
May 18, 2017 5:33 PM Dispatches
"I hear this “Pow!” and look over and people are fleeing and I see Erin limping away, clearly in pain. I thought, Oh, my God! Why did they shoot Erin?" more
May 11, 2017 1:42 PM Dispatches
Praxis Films
The image of Assange that emerges in "Risk" is complex, contradictory, controversial, and often troubling—and he may have severed ties with Poitras as a result. more
May 3, 2017 3:25 PM Dispatches
“This Land is Our Land! This Land is Our Land! It is not your land, because it’s our land! Because we bought it. That’s why it’s our land! This land belongs to him and me! ” more
Apr 25, 2017 10:24 PM Dispatches 1 Comments
Mona Shaikh
Her work has been banned in her home country Pakistan, which she’s described as “a land of virgins,” and she’s even received death threats. more
Mar 23, 2017 9:12 AM Dispatches
Travel ban on Hades... more
Mar 9, 2017 12:00 AM Dispatches
© Keri Pickett, 2015
By presenting the often overlooked female indigenous point of view, the filmmakers of the Native Women in Film Film Festival are pathfinders, blazing new trails in cinema and culture. more
Feb 28, 2017 10:08 AM Dispatches 1 Comments
Hollywood Reporter
Almost half of the 2016 tenth annual Progie Awards—which highlight progressive features, documentaries, and artists—have been awarded to African American talents. No “diversity drought” here. more
Feb 25, 2017 12:00 AM Dispatches
Lightyear Entertainment
Celebrating its silver anniversary with a wealth of silver screen productions from around the world. Lots of good ones here for your movie list. more
Feb 16, 2017 3:43 PM Dispatches
Hollywood Reporter
Instead of rewarding only glitz and glamour The Progie awards zoom in last year's best commentary on the human condition. Here are the picks for the year. more
Jan 19, 2017 12:00 AM Dispatches
Part great escape, part poetry in motion, the film shows a different side of the great poet’s revolutionary spirit. more
Dec 16, 2016 3:08 PM Dispatches
New documentary calls for a close examination of the role of the press in our democracy. more
Nov 4, 2016 2:33 PM Dispatches
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